Book of the Week

Our bodies can not be healthy without a balanced diet, and we can not have a balanced diet without colorful vegetables and fruit - 'living food' - uncooked, non-pasteurized, and minimally processed.

Have you tried wheatgrass, chlorella, spirulina, barley grass and kumut? Have you tried to increase the amount of 'green foods' in your diet for a long period of time? Have your tried to cut out all sugar and refined carbohyrates, all alcohol and all processed food? How did you feel?

Changing our diets will result in changes in our health. When we reduce the chemical burden on our bodies, we'll feel more vibrant, energetic, and light, and this will translate to better attitudes, less conflict, more cooperation and in the long run - peace. We can transform not only our own health but the whole well-being of the world - starting simply with the food we put into our mouth.

If you want to know more about how green foods heal, how an alkaline diet can improve your health and what food is abundant with vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and chlorophyll that our bodies need - be inspired by The Green Foods Bible by David Sandoval (Freedom Press 2007).

The Best Food On the Planet

No single thing effects our lives or the world we live in as mmuch as eating. Our bodies are our temples and once our temples are clean and pure, there is space for divinity, insight and virtue to reside. It is said that cleanliness is next to godliness, and we can all choose clean and fresh food that help our bodies to glow and sparkle.

When we invest in our health, the returns will filter into all aspects of our lives. Health is about looking at the food we eat and determining whether or not it is the best food on the planet. That is what we all should have and that is what is available to us if we choose it and if we are lucky enough to live in a part of the world where we have that luxury to think about health.

Refined sugar is a drug, and there is no way to get around that. It causes artificial highs, depression, mood swings and energy crashes. It was used as a recreational drug back in the sixteenth century in the royal courts of Europe. We are what we eat. We can choose fresh and colorful food and to be light, vibrant, fresh and alive, or we can choose highly processed food and be dull, gray, heavy and lifeless.

Raw foods are organic, uncooked and unprocessed vegetables, fruits, herbs, spices, sprouts, sea vagetables, nuts and seeds that haven't been exposed to high temperatures, thus maintaining their enzymatic and nutritional properties. Cooking causes major chemical changes to the food and then the food contains new and unrecognisable chemicals. Most raw foodists are vegetarian or vegan, but some eat raw fish and meat.

For more information about Raw Food, try one of these books:

• Natalia Rose, Raw Food, life force energy (Collins 2008)
  
  
• Wendy Rudell, The Raw transformation (North Atlantic Books 2006)
  
  
• Mathew Kenney & Sarma Melngailis, Raw Food, Real World (Harper Collins 2005)
  
  
• Kate Wood, Eat Smart, Eat Raw (Square One 2006)
  
  
• Rose Lee Calabro, Living in the Raw (Book Publishing Company 1998)
  
  
• Matt Amsden, Rawvolution (Harper Collins 2006)
  
  
• Stephen Arlin, Nature's first law, the raw food (Maul Brothers 1997)
  
  
• Suzanne Alex Ferrara, The Raw food primer (Council Oak Books 2003)
  
  
• Victoria Boutenko, 12 Steps to Raw foods (North Atlantic Books 2007)
  
  
• Charlie Trotter & Roxanne Klein, Raw (Ten Speed Press 2007)

Green For Life

In the book Green for Life, Victoria Boutenko compares the standard American diet with the diet of wild chimpanzees. These animals possess an extremely strong natural immunity to AIDS, Hepatitis C, cancer and other human illnesses.

Chimpanzees share an estimated 99, 4 % of genes with humans, but their diet is dramatically different from ours. The most glaring difference is that chimpanzees consume significantly more green leaves than humans.

We can all learn to love dark leafy greens and support our homeostatic balance in the most optional way. We all have the ability to heal our bodies by remembering that food is medicine and by eating food that heal rather than destroy our bodies, we don’t need any other medicine at all.

Books on Green Ways to Save the Planet

If everyone in the United States refused their ATM receipts, it would save a roll of paper more than 2 billion feet long, or enough to circle the equator 15 times.

• David Wann, Simple prosperity (St Martins 2007)
  
  
• Greg Horn, Living green (Freedom Press 2007)
  
  
• Crissy Trask, It’s easy being green (Gibbs Smith 2007)
  
  
• Elizabeth Rogers and Thomas M Kostigen, The green book, the guide to saving the planet (Three Rivers Press 2007)
  
  
• Julie Fisher-Mc Garry, Be the change you want to see in the world (Conari Press 2007)

Good Health Is A Natural State

Health is never just about food and exercise. It is about living a lifestyle that promotes wellness and maintains balance. It is about understanding our bodies as well as our attitudes, energy levels, relationships, actions and the society we live in.

5 Magazines on Health

• Natural Health (http://www.naturalhealthmag.com)
  
  
• Yoga Plus (http://www.yogaplus.org)
  
  
• Veg News (http://www.vegnews.com)
  
  
• Ascent (http://www.ascentmagazine.com)
  
  
• Women & Cancer (http://www.womenandcancermag.com)

Books On Self Improvement

• Will Bowen, A complaint free world (Doubleday 2007)
  
  
• Chris Prentiss, The alcoholism and addiction cure (Power Press 2007)
  
  
• Marianne Williamson, The Age of miracles (Hay House Books 2007)
  
  
• Bill Strickland, Making the impossible possible (Doubleday 2007)
  
  
• Bob & Melinda Blanchard, Live what you love (Sterling 2007)

Books on Life Journeys

• Nelson Mandela, Long walk to freedom (Back Bay Books 1995)
  
  
• Desmund Tutu, No future without forgiveness (Image 2000)
  
  
• Antjie Krog, Country of my skull: Guilt, sorrow, and the limits of forgiveness in the New South Africa (Three Rivers Press 2000)
  
  
• Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, A human being died that night (Mariner Books 2004)
  
  
• Muhammad Ali, The soul of a butterfly (Simon & Schuster 2004)
  
  
• Richard Branson, The Rebel Rules: Daring to be yourself in business (Fireside 2001)
  
  
• Mother Teresa, In my own words (Gramercy 1997)

Books on Courage

• Gordon Brown, Courage: Eight portraits (Bloomsbury UK 2007)
  
  
• Khaled Hosseini, A thousand splendid suns (Riverhead Hardcover 2007)
  
  
• Osho, Courage, the joy of living dangerously (St. Martin's Griffin 1999)
  
  
• John F. Kennedy, Profiles in courage (Perennial Classics 2004)
  
  
• Caroline Kennedy, Profiles in Courage for Our Time (Amazon Remainders Account 2003)

Books on Creativity

• Richard Branson, Screw it let’s do it (Virgin 2006)
  
  
• Paul Arden, It's not how good you are, its how good you want to be and Whatever you think, think the opposite (Phaidon Press 2003)
  
  
• Sam Harrison, Zing and Ideaspotting (Machillock Publishing 2004 and How Books 2006)
  
  
• Kathryn D Cramer, Change the way you see everything (Running Press Book Publishers 2006)
  
  
• Stefan Mumaw, Caffeine for the creative mind (How Books 2006)

Books on Yoga

• Geshe Michael Roach, How yoga works (Diamond 2004)
  
  
• TKV Desikachar, The heart of yoga (Inner Traditions International 1999)
  
  
• Osho, Yoga - the science of the soul (St. Martin's Griffin 2002)
  
  
• Geshe Michael Roach, How yoga works (Diamond 2004)
  
  
• Sri K Pattabhi Jois, Yoga Mala (North Point Press 2002)
  
  
• Sri S Satchidananda, The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali (Integral Yoga Publications 1990)
  
  
• B K S Iyengar, Light on yoga (Schocken 1995)

Books on Writing

• Sol Stein, Stein on writing (St Martin’s Griffin, 1995)
  
  
• Pamela Cleaver, Writing a children’s book (How to books, 2004)
  
  
• Walter Mosley, This year you write your novel (Little, Brown and Company 2007)
  
  
• Brenda Ueland, If you want to write (Graywolf press 1987)
  
  
• Karen E Peterson, Write – 10 days to overcome writer’s block (1997)
  
  
• Ralph L Wahlstrom, The Tao of writing (Adams Media Corporation 2006)
  
  
• Jack Hart, A writer’s coach – the complete guide to writing strategies that work (Random House 2007)
  
  
• Anne Lamott, Bird by bird – some instructions on writing and life (1995)
  
  
• Noah Lukeman, The first pages. A writer’s guide to staying out of the rejection pile (Fireside Books 2005)
  
  
• Ray White & Duane Lindsay, How I got published. Famous authors tell you in their own words (WD Editors 2005)
  
  
• William Zinsser, On writing well – the classic guide to writing non-fiction (Harper Perennial 1998)
  
  
• Joyce Carol Oates, The faith of a writer. Life, craft, art (Harper Collins Publishers 2004)
  
  
• Barbara De Marco Barrett, Pen on fire (DeMarco-Barrett 2004)